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yet to be decided, it is a subject in which, in the Midlands and in the great towns of the North, your "man in the street" is interested.

SPEAKING to the Yorkshire Association for the Promotion of Commercial Education at their last meeting, Mr. P. E. Hemelryk, Vice-president of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce, gave it as his opinion that a student entering a commercial school should know at least two foreign modern languages, and be sufficiently advanced in general knowledge to be able to familiarise himself with the special commercial terms, the customs and laws, as well as the peculiarities of the trade of any country the language of which he is studying. We do not know at what age the Vice-president of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce would have boys enter the commercial school, but since he would wish them spend two or three years in such a school, and two more in a commercial "bureau," the age at which the secondary school should be left would have to be fairly young. Consequently, we think Mr. Hemelryk expects a great deal too much, and we cannot help thinking that if the advocates of commercial education would first acquaint themselves with what can fairly be done in the years of school life, they would be better able to build up a rational and workable scheme of commercial work for youths who will enter upon business careers.

THE Association of School Boards have adopted a scheme of examinations in commercial knowledge. Their executive committee have decided :-(1) That, commencing with next spring, a series of examinations in the following subjects be established by the Association :-(a) Languages: English, French, German and Spanish. (b) Business subjects: Book-keeping, shorthand, commercial arithmetic, and commercial geography. (2) In connection with the language examinations a system of local viva voce tests be arranged in addition to the written papers, (3) That the charge be Is. per paper. (4) That the examiners be appointed by the executive of the Association, local arrangements being made for the viva voce examinations being held by the local authorities, acting under the support of the Association. (5) That certificates of proficiency, a few bronze medals, and money prizes be offered annually. (6) That the whole scheme be laid immediately before the School Boards, and that they be asked to make arrangements in their different localities for the appointment of committees to take charge of the question papers, to superintend the examinations, and generally to assist the officers of the Association in carrying out the scheme. The first examination will be held in March next.

AFTER conferring together, the Technical Education Board of the London County Council and the School Management Committee of the London School Board have decided upon a series of resolutions which have been adopted by the full boards. It has been agreed :-(1) That a delegacy be created for the conduct of examinations within the County of London, and that the delegacy be called the "Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy." (2) That the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy be composed at the outset of an equal [6] number of representatives of the School Board for London and of the Technical Education Board of the London County Council, and that the Clerk of the School Board for London and the Secretary of the Technical Education Board, be joint honorary secretaries. (3) That both the School Board and the Technical Education Board of the London County Council be invited to entrust to the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy the conduct of such examinations as they may think advisable. (4) That the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy have power to conduct examinations for scholarships awarded by any public bodies, trustees, or other persons within the County of London. (5) That, in the event of any such awarding body desiring to be represented

upon the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy, it be open to the delegacy at its discretion to grant such representation. (6) That it be the duty of the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy to appoint superintendents, and, when necessary, professional examiners, who must in no case be members of the delegacy. (7) That the Metropolitan Examinations Delegacy do appoint a Secretary who will be responsible for all arrangements for examinations, including, when necessary, the distribution among the professional examiners of the work of setting examination papers, examining the candidates' work, and reporting thereon.

THE Board of Education issued their first report as we were going to press with our last number, but we take the first opportunity of calling attention to some of its many points of interest. The report consists of three volumes; the first contains the general report of the Board, the second deals entirely with secondary education, and the third wholly with elementary instruction. It is difficult to imagine what idea a foreign student of education would obtain of English secondary education if his only source of information were these official bluebooks. Both in the section of the general report concerned with secondary education, as well as in the second volume entitled "Appendix to Report (Secondary Education)" the only forms of secondary education which are seriously dealt with are instruction in science and art. Judging by this report, a foreign educationist might well decide that the Board of Education have no official connection with what is usually called secondary education.

THE reports of the Inspectors for Science in connection with the South Kensington branch of the Board of Education are full of suggestive material for teachers of science and for committees responsible for the administration of schools in connection with the Board. Reporting on the question of the co-ordination of the work of the different educational authorities in a town, the Senior Chief Inspector sketches what might with advantage be the relations of the various schools. Mr. Redgrave says:-"It would appear to be of advantage that the Technical School under the Town Council should be a day school for students who have passed through a course of two or three years in a School of Science, which might be conducted by the School Board, and who may desire to qualify themselves for good positions in industrial or commercial pursuits. The School of Science managed by the School Board would in such a case be the preparatory school for the Technical School, but it would also furnish an education complete in itself for those who would leave school at the age of 15 or 16. The evening classes at the Technical School should be classes in connection with the Board, or with the City and Guilds of London Institute, while the evening classes under the School Board should in all cases be those of the Evening Continuation School, and students should be encouraged to prepare for the classes under the Technical Instruction Committee by a course of study in the Evening Continuation School."

MR. HAROLD WAGER, who reports on the Yorkshire district, raises a subject on which most science masters in secondary schools have very definite views. More than one headmaster imagines that the only time required for the proper teaching of science is that specified on the school time-table, and if judged by that standard the science master is free, the headmaster considers him available for mathematical or other teaching. To such we commend Mr. Wager's words :-" The governors or managers of many of these schools have not yet fully appreciated the fact that teachers of practical science subjects require a considerable amount of time for the preparation of the experiments for their lessons beyond the time actually

devoted to teaching. The necessary preparation for a good practical lesson in the laboratory is no light task, and if the work is to be done properly the teacher must have time for it."

TAKING these reports by the inspectors as a whole, it is very evident there has been a decided improvement in the teaching of science and art throughout the country. From every district comes information of improved equipment, better teaching and more enthusiasm. It is beginning to be more and more recognised that to be in any way educative science must be taught in a practical manner. And in addition, it is now understood that the best results, in the highest sense, can only be secured when provision is made for all students to themselves experiment. It is true that this kind of teaching is comparatively costly. But to secure British supremacy in other directions no expense has been spared. Some day it will be admitted by everybody that all sensible expenditure on education is worth while.

SIR HENRY CRAIK presided at the last annual gathering of students and friends of Queen's College, London, and delivered an address on the higher education of women. Amongst other subjects Sir Henry referred to competitive examinations, and said he believed that the new generation would look back npon this as having subordinated everything to the mad race of competitive examinations. One of the earlier traditions of Queen's College was to resist the overstrained tendency to competitive examination, and, maintaining the courage of its opinions, the college has not fallen in with views which seem to hold that knowledge is only valuable when it has a distinct hall-mark to signalise it.

THE December Cambridge Local Examinations were held at 263 centres in the United Kingdom and the Colonies. The total number of candidates (16,254) is larger than in any previous year. The entries were distributed among the various examinations as follows:-Seniors, 2,287; Juniors, 8,377; Preliminary, 5,580; 9,757 of the candidates were boys, and 6,487 girls. The numbers given above include 1,257 candidates at centres not in the United Kingdom. Nine of these centres are in the West Indies, five in Ceylon, three in the Straits Settlements; the remaining centres being Bermuda, British Columbia, British Guiana, Mauritius, Shanghai, and Valparaiso. The Higher Local Examination (212 candidates) was held contemporaneously at certain Home centres.

THE following is an analysis of the entries for certain subjects in the Junior Examination. All candidates must take up arithmetic and dictation. The following subjects are selected by at least 90 per cent. of the candidates:-Religious Knowledge, English Grammar (including Composition), English History, Geography and French; In English Literature (Shakespeare or Scott) the entries have increased since last year from 80 to 90 per cent. Euclid and Algebra are taken by more than 94 per cent. of the boys, and 37 per cent of the girls, Latin by 56 percent. of the boys and 10 per cent. of the girls, German by 6 per cent. of the boys and 10 per cent. of the girls, Greek by 5 per cent. of the boys. About 42 per cent. have selected one or more of the nine distinct subjects in Natural Science, and there is an increase this year in the entries for Experimental Science, Theoretical and Practical Chemistry, and Heat. For Drawing over 60 per cent. of the candidates enter, for Music II per cent., for Book-keeping 8 per cent., for Shorthand 4 per The percentages entering for the various subjects in the Senior Examination agree in the main with the above. The Regulations for 1901 can be obtained from Dr. Keynes, Syndicate Buildings, Cambridge, or from the local secretaries at the various centres of examination. Changes have been

cent.

made in the conditions for passing in the Natural Science section of the Senior and Junior Examinations, and in French and German the option of taking unprepared translation in place of a set book has been extended to the Preliminary Examination.

WHAT, if any, military training should be given in seco dary schools? is a question which is, naturally enough, receiving considerable attention from schoolmasters and others just now. It will probably be remembered that the Incorporated Association of Headmasters, at their general meeting last June, appointed a committee to communicate with the War Office with a view to encourage schools to take their part in the system oí national defence, and the War Office consented to receive a deputation. One of the most recent utterances on the subject was the lecture delivered by the Rev. C. G. Gull, Headmaster of the Grocers' Company's School, at the United Service Institution. Mr. Gull says that boys do not find drill irksome, and this partly because they pick up routine work more quickly than men, and partly because they enjoy the precision of the work. The imagination of the boys, too, catches the military ideal, a result which Mr. Gull finds helps very much in the mastery of drill. But there is great diversity of opinion on several aspects of the question, and we should be glad to open our correspondence columns to brief accounts of actual experience of military instruction.

THE "London University Guide" for the year 1900-1901, published by the University Correspondence College, contains, we should think, an answer to every question likely to present itself to the external student anxious to obtain a degree at the London University. The volume, which runs to nearly 300 pp., gives full information as to what to read, and where to read it, for every examination of the university for which the college prepares candidates.

IN a valuable leaderette entitled "The Education of Educators," the British Medical Journal recently called attention to the inestimable value to teachers of a working knowledge of physiology. Several instances were quoted in which definite physical ills had been mistaken for moral delinquencies. "It has been said, somewhat dogmatically perhaps, that if we knew everything we should forgive everything. And it may equally well be said that if we knew everything we should actually punish the ordinary child little or not at all." The demands upon teachers are already numerous enough, it is true, but if they will bear these sentences in mind they may be savedwhat nobody would regret more than themselves the infliction of punishment for what their pupils are in no way to blame.

THE November number of the London Technical Education Gazette contains detailed information of numerous scholarships and exhibitions to be awarded by the Board next year. In July seventy intermediate county and twenty intermediate scholarships are to be competed for by boys and girls under sixteen years of age, and five senior county scholarships by young men and women under twenty-two years of age. In April the Board will proceed to award not more than a hundred junior artisan evening Art exhibitions, not more than thirty Art scholarships, and not more than thirty Schools of Art scholarships. In June some two hundred evening exhibitions in Science and Technology will be competed for. These exhibi

tions are of two classes: half of them are for students who have attended evening continuation schools for two years, and half for students who merely satisfy the Board's requirements as to income and residence. In addition to this there are scholarships and exhibitions in horticulture, practical gardening, domestic economy, and cookery. It would seem that the Board are determined to catch any potential Davy or Faraday who

may happen to have been born within the metropolitan area. In any case it is abundantly evident that no boy or girl of ability who is anxious to study science or art need be prevented by want of means.

A GREAT future should be in store for Cirencester Grammar School. The Technical Instruction Committee of the Gloucester County Council have decided that this school shall become one of their centres for providing technical as well as secondary education. A suite of new buildings is almost complete, and the rooms are to be furnished as soon as possible. Classes, to be open to students from neighbouring villages, are to be started in science, commercial, art, and manual subjects, and special attention will, we understand, be given to agricultural subjects. The cost of the new buildings has been divided between the Gloucester County Council, the Urban District Council of Cirencester, the endowment of the school and private donations.

MATRICULATED students of the University of Durham who have attended for two sessions the lectures and classes of the College of Science at Newcastle-on-Tyne, and have passed an elementary examination in three or four branches of science, as well as a more advanced examination in any two of these subjects, receive the diploma of Associate in Science of the University of Durham. This is, we believe, the only university title of Associate in Science. Fuller information will be found in the last calendar of the Durham College of Science, as well as much interesting particulars of numerous scholarships and prizes open to students.

THE recent decision of the Corporation of the City of London not to establish at present a commercial school or college has met with considerable adverse criticism in many quarters, a fact which has called forth a long letter to The Times from Mr. T. A. Organ, the chairman of the Technical Education Board of the London County Council. In this letter Mr. Organ reviews the recommendations of a special committee appointed by his Board over which he presided for more than a year. These recommendations were printed in THE SCHOOL WORLD of March, 1900. Certain of the resolutions of this committee have since become accomplished facts; the Commercial side at University College School, over which Mr. A. Kahn has been placed, may be cited as an example. When to the work in secondary schools is added that done by the School Board in their special higher elementary schools, and that so admirably accomplished in the London School of Economics, it becomes clear that the work which a new commercial school would be called upon to perform is being satisfactorily done already. There has been too much over-lapping in English education in times past, and we think the decision of the Corporation a wise one, so far as present needs are concerned.

have arranged a special scientific department, the object of which is to supply suitable material for practical work in botany. This part of their business Messrs. Backhouse have placed in charge of Dr. A. H. Burt, who has an expert's knowledge of teachers' requirements; and when it is borne in mind that orders may be sent by telegram, it only being necessary to specify the text-book in use in the class and the chapter for which material is required, it will be seen that every means has been taken to make practical instruction easy.

WITH a view to extending an interest in the work and objects of the Childhood Society among teachers, its Council have decided to offer two prizes for the two best essays on prescribed subjects. Full particulars of the competition can be obtained from the Hon. Sec. of the Society, at Parkes Museum, Margaret Street, London.

MR. P. A. BARNETT'S chapter on the "Discipline of Character," in his "Common-sense in Education," which has already reached a third edition in England, has been translated into Russian by M. Pobiedonostzeff, the High Procurator of the Russian Holy Synod. The translation is for distribution to Russian schools.

The School Calendar (Whittaker) begins with the events of July, 1900, yet its preface is dated September, 1900, and copies were not obtainable until the end of November of the same year. The publication, which is in its fourteenth year of publication, is so useful that these vagaries in the dates with which it is concerned, and of its appearance, are much to be regretted.

THE Civil Service Commissioners announce that an open competitive examination for not fewer than ten situations as Assistant Surveyor of Taxes in the Inland Revenue Department will be held in London, Edinburgh and Dublin, commencing on January 29th, 1901. The limits of age for these situations are 19 and 22. The examination will be in the following subjects:-Arithmetic; English composition, including orthography and handwriting; geography; book-keeping by double entry; translation from and into any one of the following languages, viz., French, German or Latin; Euclid, Books I. to IV., and VI.; algebra; and political economy. A fee of £6 will be required from each candidate attending the examination. Application for permission to attend the examination must be made, on or before January 10th, to the Secretary, Civil Service Commission, S. W., on forms obtainable from him. The existing scale of salaries in the Tax Surveying Branch of the Inland Revenue Department is as follows, viz. :—Assistant Surveyors, £100 a year, rising by annual increments of £10 to £180; Surveyors, 4th class, ₤200-£380; 3rd class, £430£550; 2nd class, £600, and 1st class, £650.

THE report of the Commissioner of Education, Dr. William T. Harris, to the Secretary of the Interior on the work of the United States Bureau of Education for the year 1898-99 (volume I.) has now been published. to health. It is a large volume of some 1,248 pages, and is, like all its predecessors, brimful of valuable and interesting matter. The volume is in no sense confined to American education. The officers of the Bureau would seem to have searched the four quarters of the earth for information likely to be of use to American teachers. But the question will obtrude itself—When do American teachers get time to acquaint themselves with the contents of volumes of this size? We hope to take an early opportunity of referring to some of the valuable articles here brought together.

TEACHERS of Botany will be glad to learn that Messrs. James Backhouse & Son, Ltd., the well-known nurserymen of York,

WELSH.

We are glad to hear that Principal Viriamu Jones is restored It is a matter for general congratulation to the cause of Welsh education and to the University College of South Wales especially. Principal Jones has brought a convincing statement before the Town Council of Cardiff as to the value of a college in a large town. He showed that nearly £2,000 (including Queen's Scholarships) fell to Cardiff people, and that the college had spent over £200,000 in the town. He, therefore, pleaded that the Town Council should make a free grant of a plot of land in Cathays Park for new college buildings, which are sorely needed for the work of the college. At a later meeting of the Town Council, a resolution was passed acceding to the request for the site, which is valued at nearly £20,000. It is stated that £150,000 would be required

to provide the college with buildings adequate to its needs. Towards this sum £50,000 has been raised, including the magnificent gift of £10,000 from the Drapers' Company. Both Principal Jones and the Town Council are to be congratulated on their public spirit in securing a suitable site for an institution of such incalculable benefit for both Cardiff and the populous district around it. It now behoves Cardiff to make the building worthy of the site.

WALES is patriotic, and its University system is democratic in many ways. There is therefore nothing to be surprised at in the nationalistic colouring which attends meetings of the Court. The position of the history of Wales is not, in the opinion of some members of the Court, sufficiently prominent in the academic circle of studies. As one speaker said, "The colleges could never satisfy national aspirations if they did not show a desire to cultivate a knowledge of the historical past which justified their being called a nation." The reply is made that there are no text-books. This was answered by saying, "Let the Court take a strong stand upon this question, and the necessary text-books would soon be forthcoming." Now the debate arose with especial regard to the Matriculation Examination which is supposed to be taken by pupils in schools before entering the colleges. One speaker made the very reasonable suggestion that, since this was a question of the practical work of teachers, it would be an advantage to have a conference on the subject between the staff of the University and the teachers in the intermediate schools. But this suggestion does not seem to have found any favour, and eventually the Senate of the University (i.e., the heads of departments of study in each of the colleges) were instructed to prepare a detailed syllabus. In other words, the theory is that professors in the colleges with experience in teaching older students are to legislate for school-teachers.

ON the subject of Welsh history, no one is a greater authority than Mr. Owen M. Edwards. He has lately spoken with much warmth on the absence of its adequate teaching in Wales. He says: "Our chronicles and laws are exceedingly interesting to the student, and I know of nothing more serviceable to stimulate that curiosity which sharpens the intellect of youths when they realise that they make discoveries on their own account. I do not know of any history in regard to which it is easier for the student to obtain interesting charters and statutes to illustrate its period of growth." And so on-all in that spirit of patriotic research which everyone so highly respects and admires in Mr. Edwards. But on this very account such utterances have their danger. Mr. Edwards goes on to say: "It will long be remembered how an attempt was made to exclude it from the first examination of the University. Ever since then my love for the University of my country, like many another Welshman's love for it, has grown cool." We must assume that Mr. Edwards refers to later and academic studies when he urges the study of original documents. But neither have school teachers the leisure for such studies nor boys and girls the ability to make them, and it will be a pity if Mr. Edwards' authority is quoted largely as applying to schools. What would be the harm of a conference with school teachers, with a view to seeing what can be done by them? The imposition of a syllabus by the University Senate and Court will not alter their ability or inability to deal with the matter; but should such a syllabus be unworkable, it will not altogether unreasonably provoke their resentment in not being consulted.

IT is announced that the total number of students registered to date in the University of Wales is 1,025. In 1897, 15 qualified for degrees; in 1898, 38; in 1899, 70; and in 1900,

102.

SCOTTISH.

SPECIAL attention is directed to the following points in the recent report of the Scotch Education Department on the Examinations for Leaving Certificates :-(1) Candidates are frequently sent in for the lower grade at too early an age. The bad effect of this is twofold. It inevitably entails many failures and disappointments, and it causes a number of ordinary pupils to attempt the higher-grade paper before the normal close of the school curriculum. (2) In a fully equipped and organised secondary school all the pupils of the upper classes should aim at the higher certificate. (3) The honours certificates are meant to be a recognition of exceptional ability in individual pupils, and consequently the number obtaining such certificates may vary greatly from year to year. (4) Unless the conditions are similar, mere numerical comparisons between one school and another in regard to the number of certificates gained may be quite misleading, and may foster an undue competition that involves grave dangers. (5) Their lordships strongly deprecate the tendency to gauge the quality of the teaching in a school by the number of honours certificates gained by the pupils.

THE annual general meeting of the Association of Teachers in Secondary Schools in Scotland was held in the Royal High School, Edinburgh, Herr Gustav Hein, retiring president, in the chair. Herr Hein, in his retiring address, said that Lord Balfour's Higher Education Bill was a most statesmanlike and straightforward attempt to bring order into the chaotic state of secondary education in Scotland. The Association has for years insisted on getting a Bill for Secondary Education passed, and the members must use their best efforts to further the passing of Lord Balfour's measure this session. In regard to the recent alterations and innovations in the Leaving Certificate examinations, Herr Hein said that they are all in the direction of the views repeatedly laid before the Department by the Association

FIRST of all, the long-wished-for Group Certificate has been introduced, and it should no longer be possible for pupils to pose as possessing a Leaving Certificate when in reality they have only passed in one subject in the lower grade. The leaving certificates will never fulfil their true function until they are in fact what they are in name, viz., certificates to be issued to pupils on finishing their higher-school education, and a guarantee that the possessors of them have obtained a good sound education in a sufficiently varied group of subjects to enable them to enter on the further pursuits of life.

At the annual meeting of the Modern Languages Association, the president, Mr. Mackay, of Ayr Academy, briefly reviewed the work done by the Association during the past year. A census of text-books used for the teaching of modern languages in Scottish schools is being compiled, and a table showing the number of hours per week devoted to modern languages in the different schools in the country. The chief work of the Association had been, however, a persevering effort to bring home to the educated people of Scotland the mischief that is being done to modern languages by the unfair position in which they are placed in the Scottish universities. Mr. A. O. Schlapp, of Edinburgh University, was elected president for the coming year.

Lord Rosebery's notable address to the students of Glasgow University should aid very materially in placing modern languages in a position of equality with the classics. The Modern Languages Association has been hammering away at this subject with a persistency worthy of the importunate widow, but with very little of her success. It is, however, an incalculable gain when a Lord Rector declares from a university platform, with the almost unanimous approval of the whole press of the country,

"That there is required, on the part of the educational authorities, an admission that a man may be an educated and a cultured gentleman, although he has not seriously studied Latin and Greek, and that France and Germany possess invaluable literatures, with the advantage that they are in languages which are living and not dead."

IRISH.

THE Provost of Trinity College has resigned his seat on the Intermediate Board, which he has held for a very long period. The Lord-Lieutenant has appointed six new Commissioners, one in the room of Dr. Salmon, and five in accordance with the Intermediate Act of last session, which provided that five additional members, experts in education, should be appointed on the Board. The new Commissioners are all distinguished men who have long experience in education, and have shown themselves possessed of enlightened views: Prof. Dill, of Belfast Queen's College, the author of an able work on Roman government and society; Professors Mahaffy and Fitzgerald, of Trinity College, Dublin, the latter a strong advocate of scientific education; Monsignor Molloy, an eminent teacher of science; Father Finlay, a distinguished Fellow of the Royal University; and Dr. Starkie, the Resident Commissioner of National Education. The appointments are likely to be a great assistance in making the new scheme successful.

THE College of Science, Dublin, which will form a centre of scientific research work and instruction under the new Department of Agriculture and Industries, has a large increase in the number of its students this session. On the side of technical instruction, scholarships in science will be given to promising pupils in primary and secondary schools. The curriculum will be reorganised, and new Departments, as those for Agriculture and Sanitary Science, will be added. The professors will be required to devote some of their time to research work for the Department. The College cannot fully enter on its enlarged course till the new buildings in Kildare Street are completed.

IT is announced that a Gold Medal and Senior Moderatorship in Trinity College, Dublin, has been awarded for the first time to a woman, Miss Beatty. The Moderatorship Examination and Freshman Honours have been open since 1893 to women who have passed the Trinity College examinations for women. So far almost no candidates have presented themselves, as lectures are not open, and the B.A. degree would not be given to those winning Moderatorships, while the examinations for women were until now in no way a preparation for these advanced courses. The examinations for women have this year been altered, and are now identical with the T.C.D. Entrance (Pass and High Places) Examination, and it is hoped that if women study for the course so far opened, it may lead to greater advantages in the future.

MR. KEATINGE, lecturer in education, Oxford, completed his courses in Alexandra College in December. The lectures and practical work, which have proved very helpful to the teachers taking them, were during this visit on the subjects, English Literature, Grammar and Composition, and Geography.

AT the distribution of prizes at St. Andrews College, Dublin, in December, a very satisfactory account was given of the progress of the school, which was founded about six years ago by the Presbyterian body in Ireland under the headmastership of Mr. W. Haslett, a distinguished Royal University and Cambridge graduate. The school has now considerably over 300 pupils, and, besides university distinctions, this year occupied the first place among Irish Protestant Intermediate Schools.

THE examinations for certificates and diplomas in teaching established by Trinity College, Dublin, will be held on January 3rd and 4th, 1901.

CURRENT HISTORY.

MR. T. W. RUSSELL has resigned his position as Secretary of the Local Government Board because he differs from Lord Salisbury on Irish land policy. We are reminded of John Bright's resignation in 1882 because he did not approve of the movement against Arabi Pasha in Egypt, and of Lord Randolph Churchill's resignation of the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer because he did not approve of the expenditure on army and navy. It is evident that the British Ministry must be unanimous, of one mind. And that that one mind must be that of the Prime Minister. No one finds fault with this to-day. We feel that it is necessary that the Premier should rule the Cabinet, as the Cabinet rules the nation. So true is it that Great Britain is a monarchy, nay, an absolute monarchytempered by general elections. Yet our text-books still persist in repeating the mere party catchwords of the opposition to Walpole, who introduced this necessary unanimity into the counsels of our ministries. Till Walpole's time, and even to a small extent, later, ministries were not unanimous, and therefore weak. Since then, the Premier has governed as well as reigned, to the lasting advantage of the country.

WILLIAM MCKINLEY is not yet re-elected President of the United States of America. It is true that we know he will be elected, and it is probable that his election will not even be noticed in any of our newspapers except as an item of curious constitutional information. But he is not yet chosen. How is this? The fathers of the Republic intended that each State should choose its wisest and best as electors of the President, that these should meet, and freely choose the man whom they thought best fitted for the office. But owing to the growth of political parties, and partly also to the growth of means of communication, it has come about that each state chooses not its wisest and best, but a number of unimportant persons who pledge themselves beforehand as to the person for whom they will vote. When the inhabitants of each state therefore have decided which "ticket" has their preference, the election is practically decided, and no one cares when or where these electors meet. Their decision is now a foregone conclusion,

and their voting is as much a form as that of the dean and chapter of an English cathedral in the election of a bishop after the reception of the "letter missive" from the Queen. So impossible is it, by even the most cast-iron of written constitutions, to bind future generations to what we think best for them.

We strongly recommend our readers to "read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest," in the most serious and leisurely way, the speech which Lord Rosebery delivered as Rector of Glasgow University. Meanwhile, we cull from it this definition of Empire :— "What is Empire," said Lord Rosebery, "but the predominance of race? Human and yet

not wholly human-for the most heedless and the most cynical must see the finger of the Divine." Now let us go back to Dante and the thirteenth century. What is Empire, Dante? "Empire is the gift of God: first to the Romans, then transferred to the German nation. Empire is the government of the world in the name of God. There can be but one Emperor as there is but one God, and that Emperor all Christians must obey. It is divine, and yet not wholly divine-for the most devout must see in it the working of humanity." Such, we imagine, would have been the reply of the medieval poet. How nearly the two agree, yet how are they poles asunder.

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